Både - och : tvetydighet och ironi i Begrebet Angest

This thesis is an investigation into ambiguity and irony in Kierkegaard’s The Concept of Dread [Begrebet Angest]. The frequent ambiguities in Kierkegaard’s texts have been discussed by several scholars, and Kierkegaard’s interest in irony is evident not only from his master’s thesis On the Concept of Irony, but also from his other texts. The irony in Kierkegaard has especially been expounded on by Roger Poole and Jacob Bøggild, who both consider irony to be at the heart of Kierkegaardian writing. Furthermore, the ambiguity in Kierkegaard can also be considered typical for the existentialist line of philosophy in general. Finally, both of these subjects tie in to the difficult subject of Kierkegaard’s ”indirect communication”, a subject discussed at length by Poole. The investigation falls into three parts. The first part is essentially a preparation: the concepts of ambiguity and irony are introduced, as is their relation to each other, and the discussion of these pertaining to Kierkegaard is paraphrased. An introduction to Kierkegaard’s indirect communicationis also provided. The second part constitutes the main body of the thesis. This part consists of a reading of The Concept of Dread with special attention brought to the ambiguities of this text. These ambiguities are numerous and in most cases fundamental concepts in the book’s line of reason including things such as dread itself, sin, guilt and the demonic. This reading follows the basic layout of the book itself, interspersed with remarks and topics discussed by other scholars, notably Jonna Hjertström Lappalainen and Gordon Daniel Marino. At the end of this part, the ironic readings of Poole and Bøggild are discussed in relation to the more “direct” reading proposed previously. Such readings put even greater emphasis on the ambiguity, as the text in its entirety is ambiguous. The third part is a tentative discussion of the conflicting accounts of Bøggild, Poole and Hjertström Lappalainen, and an attempt at reconciling these into a coherent view of The Concept of Dread. It is argued that ambiguity, while not equatable with indirect communication, is nonetheless a necessary prerequisite for communicating without compromising the individual’s subjective and concrete experience of the human condition. Finally, the Kierkegaardian notion of absolute freedom as discussed by Hjertström Lappalainen is considered in relation to the “existential concepts” fundamental to existentialist philosophy and, once again, the necessity of ambiguity is shown. The task of the ambiguous or ironic text is then to communicate the subjective, that which cannot be grasped in language, making necessary a certain “emptiness” or openness with regards to the central concepts